Endings

[Lightblind]

You've been with it since the start. Be it a book, a movie, a song, or a game; it has captivated you, motivated you, maybe even changed you as a person. You wish it could go on forever, but know that at one point it will reach its climax. An inevitable occurrence. The end will come.

When an ending does come, it can be in one of various different forms.

Sheryl Tuttle, contributing author to Split – an anthology of short stories and poems reflecting dichotomies - has composed a list of types of ending at this page on her website. This is the list she has composed:

Be warned of plot progression spoilers for Watership Down by Richard Adams, The Nine Billion Names of God & The Star by Arthur C. Clark, The Twilight Zone, The Lady & Tiger by Frank R. Stockton, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling.

Spoiler:

Explicit ending – This is the ending that wraps everything up and answers all the questions. This ending will frequently tell what happens to each of the major characters, and is usually very satisfying in its completeness. Particularly well suited for novels (over short stories), when using this ending, it is especially important to watch for plot holes and missing clues. Example: Watership Down by Richard Adams.

Implicit ending – If you like an ending that is strongly based on interpretation, then you like implicit endings. These endings are more common in short fiction. An example is The Nine Billion Names of God by Arthur C. Clark.

Twist ending – As the name implies, this ending is unexpected or twisted. As a writer, everything you've led your reader to believe gets thrown out at the end, and is replaced by a new revelation when well done. If done poorly, your reader will feel cheated. The TV show The Twilight Zone was known for it's twist endings.

Tie-back ending – This ending ties the end of the story back to clues planted in the beginning. The example provided in the endings class is the short story entitled The Star by Arthur C. Clark, where the story opens with what the main character's conflict is and ends with why.

Unresolved ending – In unresolved endings, the main conflicts are left unanswered, such as in The Lady, or the Tiger by Frank R. Stockton. The reader is left to ponder the outcome. Cliffhanger endings would also fall under this category.

Long view ending – These endings tell what happens to the characters a significant timeframe into the future. An example is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling, which ends telling who married whom, who had kids, etc. out into the future.

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She ends the list with a very strong additional note: readers/viewers/listeners/etc. prefer happy endings, with the exception of the horror and non-fiction genres.


So, PokeCommunity, here are some questions to answer:

What is your favorite type of ending? Reason?
What makes a good ending for you and why? Does anything have to be resolved for you to fully appreciate it? Happy? Sad?
What was your favorite ending? Reason?
What was your least favorite ending? Reason?
Other endings you'd like to comment on?
Do you think it is wrong to alter endings for your own amusement?
Additional comments?
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Try to branch out! Come up with your own questions to answer/suggest for others to answer! Just make sure you stay on topic (remember, this about endings, not stories themselves - your favorite story doesn't have to have your favorite ending), and make sure to answer how you feel, not how someone else does unless you agree with them. Remember to use spoiler tags where you think they should be!

 

[Shining Raichu]

I'm gonna reply to this later when I have more time (it's incredibly detailed and well thought-out, well done!) but from what I can see this belongs more in Culture & Media because it relates to story elements found in books/movies etc. So I'm gonna move it there :)

 

[Banjora Marxvile]

I love a mix of implicit and explicit endings. Those that wrap some things up but leave many other things to your imagination, such as in the F.E.A.R. franchise. Every game ends explaining pretty much everything that happened, yet still leaves some questions (namely related to what you see right at the end) and doesn't answer some things (like why there are Abomination experiments in the school, or why Alma is so important to Aristride despite her attempts to destroy her earlier in the series)

In saying that, my favourite ending was to a performance by Madness on Top of the Pops. Their final performance before splitting up, both guitarist and bass guitarist turned their instruments around to reveal "The End" written on, a fitting end to a mad group (they reformed 6 years after)

I know this doesn't class as an ending, but the last episode of Heroes before it was cancelled was both good and bad. It opened up for a whole new series with some things to think about, but... That's the thing about doing that. Leaving that as the final thing of the series doesn't guarantee a new series or whatever, it may just be left unresolved. It made me feel disappointed about it being cancelled personally.

 

[Esper]

I like an ending that suits the story and that gives me some satisfaction. It doesn't need to be a happy ending as long as it acknowledges that it isn't a happy ending. I can't think of a good example of what I mean, but it's the kind of ending where maybe someone dies and you're sad it happens and it seems unfair, but some other other character survives and sees the unfairness of it. An acknowledgement that it's not a happy ending.

"Surprise" endings bother me. Not twist endings, but the kind that pop out of nowhere and have no setup, no foreshadowing. The ones that are there just to be surprising. The kind that bother me the most are random deaths of characters with the excuse usually being something along the lines of it being "realistic" for random people to die in dangerous situations. Worse than that are when you have the same situation, but with certain characters having magical immunity because they're the main characters or whatnot.

Spoiler:

Like the end of Harry Potter with the big battle where a bunch of people die, but you know that whatever happens Harry, Ron, and Hermione will all be fine.

It just ruins the believability of the story to kill people off without there being a good plot reason and claiming it's because it's one of those harsh realities of life all while shielding certain characters you don't want to die.

 

[Rogue planet]

Good thread.

I like all endings, with the exception of explicit and long-view endings. Of course there are some of those endings that I enjoy, but generally speaking they are the least satisfying.

I like stories that keep you guessing until the very end, twists are very fun especially when it all makes sense yet still was hard to guess. It doesn't always need to be a twist, I guess just anything that's a bit surprising, because I hate it when something blatantly is going happen. My favourite types are unresolved and implicit endings. Those are the endings that really make you think about the story, it's meaning etc. it's endings like that which keep me thinking about a story for weeks after finishing them.

Generally speaking I like stories that aren't just a short journey, beginning, middle, end, and that's it. I like it when they're vague, and give no clear definition to anything. Stories that you have to actually think about to understand.

 

[Lightblind]

Heheh, thanks Shining Raichu! Sorry about that.

I meant to reply quicker but got caught up in something important, and now today I'm getting the blue screen of death. Now I feel super guilty.



Though I'm not very fond of unresolved endings, I love stories that have any of the other types of endings combined with a good tie-back and/or a good twist. It's also fun to be able to tailor a combination of explicit and implicit ending types as Banjora Marxvile said into something of your own creation. To make it your own.

What I like to see in endings the most - no matter what type - is believability. Other than what Scarf stated about the reality of death and tragedy, which I also totally agree with, is the suggested outcome of relationships and the length of the climax itself. Relationships can deal not just with couples but with groups. I always love learning how they turn out because I'm a sap. Concerning the length of the climax, I'm simply saying that it should be long enough to suit what it holds and end the story appropriately, even if it is unresolved.

As for some good endings, I'd like to reference Ray Blackbury's short stories: The Fog Horn, The Flying machine and The Dragon (which is also a graphic novel). Each tale has a spectacular ending that leaves you thinking about what is right and what is wrong.

 

[Her]

Forgive me for ranting, but:
LOST. That show had the worst ending of any show I have seen in my time, the absolute worst. It's not anything to do with the actors, for I loved Matthew Fox and Evangeline Lilly, it's simply how poorly J.J Abrams finishes the show that drives me crazy. They all died in the plane crash and they continued their 'existence' on the island just so they could get to know each other? No. That doesn't work for me. That doesn't work for me at all.
I love endings that tie back into the beginning of the story, so I appreciate what Abrams is trying to do here. But to me, it just doesn't work. It's too flimsy and it all seemed rather hastily put together, like Abrams was hurriedly trying to create a end to the plot under pressure from an overbearing boss or something, lol.

As I stated earlier, I love tie-back endings. They're usually very enjoyable for me and I love having an "OHHHHHHHHHH THATS CLEVER!" moment when I read a tie-back ending. But really, as long as the endings are not unresolved or implicit endings, I'm fine.

Unresolved endings drive me crazy. I want to know what happened, did the character die/live, did they complete their objective etc. I don't want to to figure it out for myself or be left in the dark, that's just extremely annoying to me. I may be simply ignorant, but idk, it just pisses me off so much, lol.

 

[Mr Cat Dog]

I like all of the endings mentioned in the quote by the OP apart from the 'Long view ending'. For the most part, I really don't care if the characters in fiction get cancer in 20 years time or have five kids or drive off a cliff or something, at least if it's not tangentially related to the original story (i.e. the end of Six Feet Under where you find out how all the characters die, but the setting of a funeral home gave that ending an added bit of poignancy that, say, the Harry Potter series didn't).

All of the others have the capacity to be very good endings or very bad. It all depends on the author/writer/film-maker concerned as to how to maximize the ending. If I had to pick a favourite, it'd probably be an implicit ending; it's also probably the hardest to get right, which is why I really respect stories that do these well, if only for admiration of craft more than anything else.